When I was a kid, I learned a song called Peace in the Valley from a Pat Boone 45. I've been singing it his way ever since. Peace in the Valley was written by the Rev. Thomas A. Dorsey, an African-American minister and resident of St. Louis (among other places, I think.)

This Christmas, I bought a book (from Hal Leonard Publishing)called "Great Gospel Songs of Thomas A. Dorsey" to give to friends. To my surprise, the melody and words for Peace in the Valley are quite different from what I learned. I've listened to various MIDI's of this song on the net, but the sites don't make the difference clear. I found three or four new-fangled versions and only one original. So, if Joe is willing, the MIDI that I made of the melody as written by Thomas A. Dorsey should appear here.

The song is still copyrighted, but I think that we can regard this MIDI as "a short excerpt for scholarly purposes."

The melody occurs twice in the MIDI - once in the original key of F, for high soprano, and then again in the key of C for lower voices. In the second-to-last measure, the word Peace gets two notes.

If there is much interest, I will post the original lyrics later.